by Dan Simmons
Victoria was tired and fussy, so we put her down in her nest early. Then we called down to Room Service and waited an hour for dinner to arrive. When it did show up, it consisted mostly of a lesson to me never to order cold roastbeef sandwiches in a Hindu country. I begged some of Amrita's excellent Chinese dinner.
At nine P.M., while Amrita was showering before bed, there was a knock at the door. It was a boy with the fabric from the sari shop. The youngster was dripping wet, but the material was safely wrapped in a large plastic bag. I tipped him ten rupees, but he insisted on exchanging the bill I gave him for two five-rupee notes. The ten-rupee bill was torn slightly, and Indian currency evidently became non-negotiable when damaged. That exchange put me in a less than pleasant mood, and when Amrita emerged in her silk robe she took one look in the bag and announced that it was the wrong fabric. The shop had switched her bolts of material with Kamakhya's. We then spent twenty minutes going through the phone book trying to find the proper Bharati, but the name was as common as Jones would be in a New York directory and Amrita thought that Kamakhya's family probably didn't have a phone anyway.
"To hell with it," I said.
"Easy for you to say. You didn't spend over an hour picking out the material."
"Kamakhya will probably bring your stuff by."
"Well, it will have to be tomorrow if we're leaving early Monday morning."
We turned in early. Victoria awoke once, sobbing slightly in some baby's dream that made her arms and legs paddle in frustration, but I carried her around the room for a while until she drifted off to sleep, drooling contentedly on my shoulder. During the next couple of hours the room seemed alternately too hot and then chilly. The walls rattled from various mechanical noises. It sounded as if the place were honey-combed with dumbwaiters, each being pulled laboriously by chains and pulleys. An Arab group two doors away shouted and laughed, never thinking to move the party into their suite and close the door.
At around 11:30 I rose from the damp sheets and went to the window. The rain still pelted the dark street. No traffic moved.
I opened my suitcase. I had brought only two books along: a hardback copy of my own recent publication, and a Penguin paperback I'd picked up in a London bookstore of M. Das's poetry. I sat down in a chair near the door and snapped on a reading lamp.
I confess that I opened my own book first. The pages fell open to the title poem, Winter Spirits. I tried to read through it, but the once-sharp imagery of the old woman moving through her Vermont farmhouse and communing with the friendly ghosts in the place while the snow piled in the fields did not go well with the hot Calcutta night and the sound of the heartless monsoon rattling the panes. I picked up the other book.
Das's poetry immediately captivated me. Of the short works at the beginning of the book, I most enjoyed "Family Picnic," with its humorous but never condescending insight into the need to patiently suffer the eccentricities of one's relatives. Only the passing reference to " . . . the blue, sharksharpened waters of the Bay of Bengal/ Unclouded by sail or smoke of distant steamer" and a quick description of a " . . . Mahabalipuram temple/ sandstone worn with sea age and prayer/ a smooth-cornered plaything now/ for children's climbing knees and Uncle Nani's/ snapshots" placed the locale in Eastern India.
I came to his "The Song of Mother Teresa" with new eyes. Less visible to me now were the academic echoes of Tagore's influence in the hopeful theme and more apparent were the blunt references such as " . . . street death/ curb death/ the hopeless abandonments she moved among/ a warm infant's plaint for succor/ against the cold breast of a milkless city." I wondered then if Das's epic tale of the young nun who heard her calling while traveling to another mission, who came to Calcutta to help the suffering multitudes if only by providing them a place to die in peace, would ever be recognized as the classic of compassion I felt it was.
I turned the book over to look at the photo of M. Das. It reassured me. The high forehead and sad, liquid eyes reminded me of photographs of Jawaharlal Nehru. Das's face had the same patrician elegance and dignity. Only the mouth, those slightly too-full lips upturned at the corners, suggested the sensuality and slight self-centeredness so necessary in a poet. I fancied that I could see where Kamakhya Bharati had received her sensuous good looks.
When I clicked off the light and crawled in next to Amrita, I felt better about the coming day. Outside, the rain continued to tear and batter at the huddled city.
10
"Calcutta, Lord of Nerves,
Why do you want to destroy me entirely?
I do have a horse and eternal foreign-stay
I go to my own city."
— Pranabendu Das Gupta
It was a strange mixture of people that set off for the manuscript rendezvous on Sunday morning. Gupta had called at 8:45. We had been up for two hours. During breakfast in the Garden Café, Amrita had announced her decision to go along on this trip and I couldn't sway her from it. Actually, I was relieved at the idea.
Gupta began the phone conversation in the inimitable style of all Indian telephonic communications.
"Hello," I said.
"Hello, hello, hello." The connection sounded as if we were using two tin cans and several miles of string. Static rasped and snickered.
"Mr. Gupta?"
"Hello, hello."
"How are you, Mr. Gupta?"
"Very fine. Hello, Mr. Luczak? Hello?"
"Yes."
"Hello. The arrangements have been . . . hello? Mr. Luczak? Hello?"
"Yes. I'm here."
"Hello! The arrangements have been made. You will come alone when we meet you at your hotel at ten-thirty o'clock this morning."
"Sorry, Mr. Gupta. My wife's coming. We decided that — "
"What? What? Hello?"
"I say, my wife and child are coming along. Where are we going?"
"No, no, no. It is arranged. You are to come alone."
"Yes, yes, yes," I said. "Either my family goes along today or I don't go at all. To tell you the truth, Mr. Gupta, I'm a little tired of this James Bond bullshit. I came twelve thousand miles to pick up a piece of literary work, not to sneak around Calcutta alone. Where is the meeting to take place?"
"No, no. It would be better if you were to go alone, Mr. Luczak."
"Why is that? If it's dangerous, I want to know — "
"No! Of course it is not dangerous."
"Where's the meeting to take place, Mr. Gupta? I really don't have time for this nonsense. If I go home empty-handed, I'll write some sort of article, but you'll probably be hearing from my magazine's lawyers." It was an empty threat, but it caused a silence broken only by the hiss, crackle, and hollow clunks normal to the line.
"Hello? Hello, Mr. Luczak?"
"Yes."
"Very well. Your wife will, of course, be very welcome. We are to meet M. Das's representative at Tagore's home — "
"Tagore's home?"
"Yes, yes. It is a museum, you know."
"Marvelous!" I said. "I had hoped to see Tagore's house. That's excellent."
"Mr. Chatterjee and I will be at your hotel at ten-thirty o'clock then. Hello, Mr. Luczak?"
"Yes?"
"Good-bye, Mr. Luczak."
Gupta and Chatterjee did not show up until after eleven, but Krishna was in the lobby when we went down. He was wearing the same soiled shirt and rumpled trousers. He acted overjoyed to see us, bowing to Amrita, tousling Victoria's thin hair, and shaking my hand twice. He had come, he said, to inform me that our "mutual friend, Mr. Muktanandaji" had used my most gracious gift to return to his village of Anguda.
"I thought that he said he couldn't go home again."
"Ahh," said Krishna and shrugged.
"Well, I guess both he and Thomas Wolfe were wrong," I said. Krishna stared a second and then exploded with a laugh so loud that Victoria began to cry.
"You have received the Das poem?" he asked when both his laughter and Victoria's crying had subsided.
Amrita ans
wered. "No, we're going to get it right now."
"Ahh," smiled Krishna, and I could see the gleam in his eyes.
On an impulse I asked, "Would you like to accompany us? Perhaps you'd like to see what kind of manuscript a water-logged corpse can produce."
"Bobby!" said Amrita. Krishna only nodded, but his smile was more sharklike than ever.
Gupta and Chatterjee were less than thrilled at the size of our party. I didn't have the heart to tell them that an unknown number of Calcutta's Finest were also going along.
"Mr. Gupta," I said, "this is my wife, Amrita." Pleasantries were exchanged in Hindi. "Gentlemen, this is our . . . guide, Mr. M. T. Krishna. He will also accompany us."
The two gentlemen nodded tersely, but Krishna beamed. "We have already met! Mr. Chatterjee, you do not remember me?"
Michael Leonard Chatterjee frowned and adjusted his glasses.
"Ah, you do not. Nor you, Mr. Gupta? Ah, well, it was some years ago, upon my return from Mr. Luczak's fair country. I petitioned for membership in the Writer's Union."
"Oh, yes," said Chatterjee, although it was obvious that he remembered none of it.
"Yes, yes." Krishna smiled. "I was told that my prose 'lacked maturity, style, and restraint.' Needless to say, I was not granted admission to the Writers' Union."
Everyone squirmed in embarrassment except for Krishna. And me. I was beginning to enjoy this. Already, I was glad that I'd invited Krishna along.
It was a crowded little Premiere that drove east from the hotel. Gupta, Chatterjee, and Chatterjee's liveried driver were crammed into the front seat. As far as I could tell, the driver had one arm out the window, the other hand was frequently adjusting his cap, and he was driving with his knees. The effect was no different than usual.
In the back, I sat squeezed between Krishna and Amrita holding Victoria on her lap. We were all perspiring freely, but Krishna seemed to have started earlier than the rest of us.
It was absurdly hot. Upon leaving the air-conditioned hotel, Amrita's camera lens and Chatterjee's glasses had steamed up. It was at least 110 degrees, and my cotton shirt immediately became plastered to my back. In the littered plaza across from the hotel, forty or fifty men squatted with their bony knees higher than their chins, trowels, mortarboards, and plumb bobs on the pavement in front of them. It seemed to be some sort of work lineup. I asked Krishna why they were there, and he shrugged and said, "It is Sunday morning." Everyone else seemed satisfied with this Delphic utterance, so I said nothing.
Moving down Chowringhee, we made a right turn in front of Raj Bhavan — the old Government House — and drove south on Dharamtala Street. The air coming in the open windows did not cool us but rasped at our skins like hot sandpaper. Krishna's matted hair whipped around like a nest of snakes. At every stop sign or traffic policeman, the driver would turn off the engine and we would sit in sweaty silence until the car moved again.
We drove east onto Upper Circular Road and then swung onto Raja Dinendra Street, a winding road which paralleled a canal. The stagnant water reeked of sewage. Naked children splashed in the brown shallows.
"Look there," ordered Chatterjee, pointing to our right. A large temple was painted in Technicolor glory. "The Jain Temple. Very interesting."
"The Jain priests will take no life," said Amrita. "When they leave the temple, they have servants sweep the walk so that they won't inadvertently step on an insect."
"They wear surgical masks," said Chatterjee, "so that they will not accidentally swallow any living thing."
"They do not bathe," added Krishna, "out of respect for the bacteria which live on their bodies."
I nodded, and silently speculated on whether Krishna himself honored this particular Jain code. Between the usual Calcutta street smells, the reek of raw sewage, and Krishna, I was beginning to feel a little overwhelmed.
"Their religion forbids them to eat anything which is living or was living," Krishna said happily.
"Wait a minute," I said. "That rules out everything. What do they live on?"
"Ahh." Krishna smiled. "Good question!"
We drove on.
Rabindranath Tagore's home was in Chitpur. We parked on a narrow sides street, walked through a gate into an even narrower courtyard, and removed our shoes in a small anteroom before entering the two-story building.
"Out of reverence to Tagore, this home is treated like a temple," Gupta said solemnly.
Krishna kicked off his sandals. "Every public monument in our country becomes a temple sooner or later," he laughed. "In Varanasi, the government built a structure housing a large relief map of India to educate the ignorant peasants about our national geography. Now it is a holy temple. I have seen people worship there. It even has its own feast day. A relief map!"
"Quiet," said Chatterjee. He led us up a dark stairway. Tagore's suite of rooms was empty of furniture, but the walls were lined with photographs and display cases showing off everything from original manuscripts that must have been worth a fortune to cans of the Master's favorite snuff.
"We seem to be alone," said Amrita.
"Oh, yes," agreed Gupta. The writer looked even more like a rodent when he smiled. "The museum is usually closed on Sundays. We are privileged to be here only by special arrangement."
"Great," I said to no one in particular. Suddenly, from speakers on the wall, there came recordings of Tagore's voice, high and squeaky, reading excerpts of his poetry and singing some of his ballads. "Marvelous."
"M. Das's representative should be here shortly," said Chatterjee.
"No hurry," I said. There were large canvases of Tagore's oil paintings. His style reminded me of N. C. Wyeth's — an illustrator's version of impressionism.
"He won the Nobel Prize," said Chatterjee.
"Yes."
"He composed our national anthem," said Gupta.
"That's right. I'd forgotten," I said.
"He wrote many great plays," said Gupta.
"He founded a great university," said Chatterjee.
"He died right there," said Krishna.
We all stopped and followed Krishna's pointing finger. The corner was empty except for small balls of dust. "It was 1941," Krishna said. "The old man was dying, running down like an unwound clock. A few of his disciples gathered here. Then more. And more. Soon all of these rooms were filled with people. Some had never met the poet. Days passed. The old man lingered. Finally a party began. Someone went to the American military headquarters . . . there were already soldiers in the city . . . and returned with a projector and reels of film. They watched Laurel and Hardy, and Mickey Mouse cartoons. The old man lay in his coma, all but forgotten in the corner. From time to time he would swim up out of his death sleep like a fish to the surface. Imagine his confusion! He stared past the backs of his friends and the heads of strangers to see the flickering images on the wall."
"Over here is the pen that Tagore used to write his famous plays," Chatterjee said loudly, trying to draw us away from Krishna.
"He wrote a poem about it," continued Krishna. "About dying during Laurel and Hardy. In those last days he dated his poems, knowing that each one could be his last. Then, in the brief periods between coma, he wrote down the hour as well. Gone was his sentimental optimism. Gone was the gentle bonhomie that marked so much of his popular work. For, you see, between poems, he now was facing the dark face of Death. He was a frightened old man. But the poems . . . ahh, Mr. Luczak . . . those final poems are beautiful. And painful. Like his dying. Tagore looked at the cinema images on the wall and wondered — 'Are we all illusions? Brief shadows thrown on a white wall for the shallow amusement of bored gods? Is this all?' And then he died. Right there. In the corner."
"Come this way," snapped Gupta. "There is much more to see."
There was indeed. Photographs of Tagore's friends and contemporaries included autographed images of Einstein, G. B. Shaw, and a very young Will Durant.
"The Master was a strong influence on Mr. W. B. Yeats," said Chatter
jee. "Did you know that the 'rough beast' in 'The Second Coming' — the lion body with the head of a man — was drawn from Tagore's description to Yeats of the fifth incarnation of Vishnu?"
"No," I said. "I don't think I knew that."
"Yes," said Krishna. He ran his hand over the top of a dusty display case and smiled at Chatterjee. "And when Tagore sent Yeats a bound edition of his Bengali poetry, do you know what happened?" Krishna ignored the frowns from Gupta and Chatterjee. He dropped into a crouch and wielded an invisible weapon with both hands. "Why, Yeats charged across his London sitting room, grabbed a large samurai sword which had been a gift, and smote Tagore's book thus . . . Ayehh!!"
